Not quite ours, but I thought it was interesting.
This morning, Pope Benedict appoint a new Auxiliary Bishop for the Diocese of Haarlem-Amsterdam in the Netherlands. A neat reminder of the Dutch roots of New York City.
Tuesday, October 25, 2011
Monday, October 24, 2011
Just who said what today in Rome?
Much has been written today about the Vatican's supposed call for a central world bank. Bob Moynihan of Inside The Vatican has a nice explanation of just what did come from Rome today:
The important piece of news out of Rome today is that the Vatican has allegedly called for a "central world bank" in reponse to the continuing speculation and instability in the world financial system.
I say "allegedly" because the text in which this call appears is not by Pope Benedict, but by a Vatican office, the Council for Justice and Peace. Such an office can issue papers which do not bear the Pope's "seal of approval" in the same way that a papal encyclical would.
We are dealing here, then, with something on the order of a "position paper," not a text containing authoritative magisterial teaching.
It is a serious document, worth weighing with real attention ... but not a document with binding doctrinal authority.
Nevertheless, after the Vatican released the document at a press conference this morning, the internet was abuzz with reports like ... one from Reuters, suggesting that this document's call for some controls over global financial speculation links the Vatican ideologically to the US protest movement "Occupy Wall Street" (!!!).
That's a bit of a stretch.
Sunday, October 16, 2011
Newsflash: 84 year old Pope is old!
MSNBC made a point of reminding us that the Pope is "aging" (add to that USA Today and the AP). Gotta love those reporters. You think they had anonymous sources? You think they did any research, digging out the Pope's birth certificate? Maybe they can send their ace investigators to find our President's birth certificate.
A few things to remember here:
- Yes, the Pope is 84 years old.
- The aisle of St. Peter's Basilica is long. Walking up the center aisle would be about the equivalent of walking a football field from goalpost to goalpost.
- The Pope is 5'6 (without miter). The platform raises him up another two feet, allowing people to see him other than those who squeeze onto the aisle.
- A crazy woman jumped the Pope a few Christmases ago. The platform makes it harder for nutjobs to get at him.
- Staying on the "crazy" tangent, there are mothers who literally hold their infants out into the aisle, hoping to get the Pope to stop by them. The platform stops what must be child abuse in some form.
Friday, October 07, 2011
Feast of St. Francis of Assisi.
I know, about four days after the feast. But I was away during the middle of the week, and didn't have the chance to give some thoughts. Well, one big thought, really. I used this at the homily I gave at morning Mass.
I'm not sure how many of you are Star Trek fans, but the plot of one of the many movies jumped out at me early Tuesday morning, as I wondered what to preach about. Remember Star Trek: First Contact, when the crew goes back in time (I know, they always go back in time) to make sure the Borg don't prevent Zephram Cochrane from making the first contact with a passing Vulcan ship?
Going back in time to stop the Borg from preventing First Contact, the Enterprise crew meet Zephram Cochrane, the man they grew up knowing as this almost mythical, legendary figure. In the future, there are monuments to him, high schools named after him, his theories are required courses in Starfleet Academy, and the place where his rocket took off has become a National Park and historic site. But when they meet him, he's not the larger than life-pioneer-scientist they expected him to be. He's a slob. He drinks too much. He flirts with the girls. He likes Roy Orbison music. He burps and makes other bodily noises. When they tell him the truth about their mission there, he tries to run away. It's all too much for him to comprehend. He tries telling them, "I'm not a statue, I'm just a man!"
What would St. Francis say to us, if we all went back in time to meet him? Certainly we'd all want to touch him, shake his hand, whip out our iPhones and snap a photo with him (preferably with a bird on his shoulders). Maybe we'd tell him how his little Porziuncola is now surrounded by a mammoth Basilica. Maybe we'd thank him for Nativity Scenes and "Make me a channel of your peace..." (Though he'd look at us funny, since he didn't write it). Perhaps Francis would laugh, thinking we're joking. He, too, might run away from all the attention, all this being too much for him to comprehend. He, too, might say, I'm not a statue (or a stained glass window); I'm just a man."
Maybe we've made St. Francis "larger than life", too. Maybe we've made him so out of our league when it comes to works and holiness that we can't even imagine genuine imitation of him. Being so far out of our range makes him "safe", we all agree he's too unreachable so we all agree not to try. Maybe we forget that the Saints were human beings like us, given the same graces, having the same weaknesses.
What if it were the other way? What if Francis came to our time, came to your parish, came to a Mass you were at, and sat next to you. Maybe you make small talk with him; maybe he introduces himself to you. What if he tells you he came from the past to tell us that sanctity is possible? What if someone else came and sat next to you at Mass, and told you they were from the future, and in their parish is a statue of you. How would you react?
I'm not sure how many of you are Star Trek fans, but the plot of one of the many movies jumped out at me early Tuesday morning, as I wondered what to preach about. Remember Star Trek: First Contact, when the crew goes back in time (I know, they always go back in time) to make sure the Borg don't prevent Zephram Cochrane from making the first contact with a passing Vulcan ship?
Geek diversion: In the Star Trek world, Cochrane's experimental Warp Drive flight catches the attention of a passing ship of Vulcans, convincing them that humans are not so primitive and are ready to find out that they're not alone in the universe. The Vulcans make the historic "first contact" with human beings.
Going back in time to stop the Borg from preventing First Contact, the Enterprise crew meet Zephram Cochrane, the man they grew up knowing as this almost mythical, legendary figure. In the future, there are monuments to him, high schools named after him, his theories are required courses in Starfleet Academy, and the place where his rocket took off has become a National Park and historic site. But when they meet him, he's not the larger than life-pioneer-scientist they expected him to be. He's a slob. He drinks too much. He flirts with the girls. He likes Roy Orbison music. He burps and makes other bodily noises. When they tell him the truth about their mission there, he tries to run away. It's all too much for him to comprehend. He tries telling them, "I'm not a statue, I'm just a man!"
What would St. Francis say to us, if we all went back in time to meet him? Certainly we'd all want to touch him, shake his hand, whip out our iPhones and snap a photo with him (preferably with a bird on his shoulders). Maybe we'd tell him how his little Porziuncola is now surrounded by a mammoth Basilica. Maybe we'd thank him for Nativity Scenes and "Make me a channel of your peace..." (Though he'd look at us funny, since he didn't write it). Perhaps Francis would laugh, thinking we're joking. He, too, might run away from all the attention, all this being too much for him to comprehend. He, too, might say, I'm not a statue (or a stained glass window); I'm just a man."
Maybe we've made St. Francis "larger than life", too. Maybe we've made him so out of our league when it comes to works and holiness that we can't even imagine genuine imitation of him. Being so far out of our range makes him "safe", we all agree he's too unreachable so we all agree not to try. Maybe we forget that the Saints were human beings like us, given the same graces, having the same weaknesses.
What if it were the other way? What if Francis came to our time, came to your parish, came to a Mass you were at, and sat next to you. Maybe you make small talk with him; maybe he introduces himself to you. What if he tells you he came from the past to tell us that sanctity is possible? What if someone else came and sat next to you at Mass, and told you they were from the future, and in their parish is a statue of you. How would you react?
Thursday, October 06, 2011
Make your way to the movies!
Last Monday, I was invited to a screening of the movie, The Way, starring Martin Sheen and written, produced, and directed by his son, Emilio Estevez. Why was I invited? I wish I could tell you it was because I am an influential member of the Catholic media, or that I was going to have Sheen and/or Estevez on my old radio show (at times I do miss it). Truth be told, my name is still on old contact lists for some media outlets that have Catholic connections, so off to Bensalem, Pennsylvania I went, bringing along my bud, Fr. Guy Selvester.
The movie begins with a father (played by Sheen) being told that his son (played in cameos by Estevez) was killed in a weather-related accident while making the ancient Camino pilgrimage from France and across Spain. Once there to identify and bring his son's body home, Sheen decides to make the pilgrimage himself, bringing his son's cremated remains along on last "father/son" thing they would ever do. Along the way, he meets people who both change him and are changed by him.
No surprise to anyone we're a sedentary society. The same holds true for Catholics, who sit in a car to get to Mass, sit in a pew, and then sit in the car again to go home. This movie reminds us of one of the most ancient and overlooked traditions of our faith: The pilgrimage. Can anything else be more Christlike than to go from town to town, being welcomed into homes and eating what's there? In the Q&A afterwards, Sheen put it this way: "People on pilgrimage tend to overpack, and as they walk, they discard what they find they don't really need. It starts with things, but after a while, they start letting go of feelings: anger, hostility; things they've been carrying for 35 years."
It's a great movie, and I wholeheartedly recommend seeing it. Just be prepared to hear that little voice in you question whether a pilgrimage wouldn't be good for you? I know it did that for me. For more information about the movie and where it is showing, click HERE.
Monday, October 03, 2011
Me, KHS
Do not adjust your computer screens, people, yes, that's me all dressed up. This past weekend I was invested into [deep breath] The Equestrian Order of the Holy Sepulchre of Jerusalem, at a ceremony at St. Patrick's Cathedral in Manhattan. No, I didn't have to get on a horse (I know PETA would've called that animal cruelty). I'm in the mozzetta that Priest Knights wear: white with the Jerusalem Cross in red on the side. This picture was taken at the Vigil Service the day before, held at the Church of Our Saviour, also in NYC. Bishop Barres of Allentown presided at that Mass, in which we were "presented" with the mozzetta. The investiture Mass was done by Archbishop O'Brien, former Abp. of Baltimore, New York native, and the Pro-Grand Master of the Order (the "Pro" gets removed when he is created a Cardinal, which is practically a "done deal" by being named to the office), in the presence of Abp. Dolan of New York, and a bunch of other prelates. In the picture, I'm not yet wearing the actual decoration, which hangs on a black ribbon around the neck. We received that after the Investiture Mass.
For more information about the order, click on this LINK from the Vatican website.
Sunday, October 02, 2011
Thoughts for this Sunday's Gospel
Again with the vineyard! Two weeks ago it was about the vineyard owner's generosity in paying full day's wages to those who hadn't worked a full day. Last week it was about his sons, one a whiner who ends up doing what he's told, and the other a sweet-talker who tells you what you want to hear but doesn't carry through.
This Sunday's readings give us our last glimpse into this vineyard, and we go out in style: Isaiah gives us his friend's vineyard song, Psalm 80 is our Responsorial Psalm (all about a vine), and the Gospel tells about nasty vineyard tenant farmers who refuse to give the owner what he's owed from the harvest.
In the parable, Jesus makes a point of mentioning 3 attributes of the vineyard:
This Sunday's readings give us our last glimpse into this vineyard, and we go out in style: Isaiah gives us his friend's vineyard song, Psalm 80 is our Responsorial Psalm (all about a vine), and the Gospel tells about nasty vineyard tenant farmers who refuse to give the owner what he's owed from the harvest.
In the parable, Jesus makes a point of mentioning 3 attributes of the vineyard:
- A hedge, which was almost always a thick thorn bush, deliberately chosen to keep out animals and discourage human thieves.
- A winepress, used to crush the grapes and get the juice.
- A watchtower, which not only gave a view to see any thieves approaching, but was a place to house workers.
Those details jumped out at me this weekend. They're not really necessary for the point of the parable to be made, and yet we're told about them. Let's focus on them:
The hedge. From what has God been protecting us?
The winepress. What has stubbornness done to us? What does God have to "squeeze" out of us in order to obtain?
The tower. Perspective changes everything. What would we have done differently in our lives, had we seen it from another point of view?
Possible miracle of Archbishop Fulton Sheen under investigation
Could we be getting ready for "Blessed Fulton Sheen"?
Sunday, September 25, 2011
Mass during a hurricane
I rediscovered this picture just now. On the Sunday morning when Hurricane Irene was overhead, I snapped this picture after finishing the 8am Mass. Power was out in the church, but the church has no shortage of candles!
Thursday, September 22, 2011
Immaculate Conception Chapel - Mt. St. Mary's University
The I.C. Chapel of Mount St. Mary's University in Emmitsburg, Maryland, serves the whole community, both the college students and the seminarians. Last week (after rescheduling the event due to Abp. Chaput's installation and the memorial Mass for Abp. Sambi) a rededication Mass took place, to commemorate the chapel renovations. Thankfully, they put the ceremony on YouTube.
Photos of the chapel and dedication can be found by clicking HERE.
Photos of the chapel and dedication can be found by clicking HERE.
Sunday, September 18, 2011
The Gospel of [gasp] Oprah!
Last week's Sunday readings gave us the theme of forgiveness. This week, we bounce off of that and tackle the question of generosity. MT 20:15 is such a great line:
Everyone knows about Oprah's "Favorite Things" episodes, where an unsuspecting audience hits the jackpot and gets to take home all sorts of things that Oprah had deemed her "favorites". This year, to do things bigger in her last season, she decided to do not one, but two "Favorite Thing" episodes. The first episode went as normal, with an audience getting their gifts on the way out of the taping. This time, though, the producers did a cruel thing: they routed the departing audience past the crowd waiting to be the audience for the next taping. Of course, the departing crowd carrying bags of stuff with smiles frozen on their faces told the story of what had happened in that previous taping. No longer happy simply with being able to be part of an Oprah taping, the resentment brewed within them, resentment that they missed that taping and resentment at Oprah's famed generosity. The link below takes you to where Oprah (knowing exactly what was about to happen) leads them on in letting out their anger. You can almost hear her the landowner's question, "Are you envious because I am generous?"
Click HERE.
"Are you envious because I am generous?"To see this Gospel lived out, I present to you a clip from this past season of the Oprah Winfrey Show. I first saw this watching a great show Oprah did about the "behind the scenes" stuff of what went into producing the episodes of her show's 25th (and final) season.
Everyone knows about Oprah's "Favorite Things" episodes, where an unsuspecting audience hits the jackpot and gets to take home all sorts of things that Oprah had deemed her "favorites". This year, to do things bigger in her last season, she decided to do not one, but two "Favorite Thing" episodes. The first episode went as normal, with an audience getting their gifts on the way out of the taping. This time, though, the producers did a cruel thing: they routed the departing audience past the crowd waiting to be the audience for the next taping. Of course, the departing crowd carrying bags of stuff with smiles frozen on their faces told the story of what had happened in that previous taping. No longer happy simply with being able to be part of an Oprah taping, the resentment brewed within them, resentment that they missed that taping and resentment at Oprah's famed generosity. The link below takes you to where Oprah (knowing exactly what was about to happen) leads them on in letting out their anger. You can almost hear her the landowner's question, "Are you envious because I am generous?"
Click HERE.
Friday, September 16, 2011
Mosaic work - "I'm not dead yet"
Yesterday I took the train into Manhattan. I came out in front of a new exit out of Penn Station on 7th Avenue. As I was taking an escalator up, my eyes caught the most beautiful and detailed mosaic tile artwork. Their beauty caught my attention, A clock, the Post Office, a Greek column.
I did some digging on the internet, and found the company that made them. Check out the panels by clicking HERE. The work was done by The Unicorn Studio, located in New York City.
How wonderful it would be to see some newly created mosaic work in churches.
I did some digging on the internet, and found the company that made them. Check out the panels by clicking HERE. The work was done by The Unicorn Studio, located in New York City.
How wonderful it would be to see some newly created mosaic work in churches.
Wednesday, September 14, 2011
Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross
My pal, Fr. Guy, put a "Cross" themed song up on his blog. I've always liked this one.
Abp. Gomez's history lesson
I both love and hate when American civil holidays intersect with the Church's calendar. I love reminding people that July 4 is the Feast of St. Elizabeth of Portugal. I love telling people in Confession that they didn't have to confess they missed Mass on Thanksgiving Day. I hate having the fight with musicians who want to play patriotic music as a hymn on Memorial Day or Veterans Day weekend (even though the actual day we celebrate it is not the Saturday night or Sunday in question). My most favorite moment was a year July 4 fell on a Saturday, and so Independence Day was "celebrated" on Monday, July 6. I was preparing for daily Mass on the Feast of St. Maria Goretti, when the parish organist came into the sacristy, telling me they would be playing for the Mass, "Because I always play on the 4th of July." I told them I'm not celebrating the 4th of July today (right about now I noticed the organist's red, white, and blue couture); I did that on the past Saturday, and that I was celebrating the Feast of St. Maria Goretti. In short, I was celebrating July 6 on July 6.
But I digress. What I love, when American civil holidays come, is to give a quick reminder of the Catholic roots of United States History. I like to remind people about how the full name of Christopher Columbus' third ship was "Santa Maria de Immaculada Concepcion", and the role of a Priest, Fr. Juan Perez, in introducing Columbus to the Spanish Royals. I love to talk about the influence of St. Robert Bellarmine on the thinking of Thomas Jefferson and James Madison. But, above all, I love telling the story of the first explorers of America, largely Catholic, and the remnants of their explorations.
Archbishop Gomez of Los Angeles brought this to light as part of a speech he game recently titled, Immigration and the Next America: Perspectives From Our History. You can read it by clicking HERE; The history part starts on page 2 of the speech.
But I digress. What I love, when American civil holidays come, is to give a quick reminder of the Catholic roots of United States History. I like to remind people about how the full name of Christopher Columbus' third ship was "Santa Maria de Immaculada Concepcion", and the role of a Priest, Fr. Juan Perez, in introducing Columbus to the Spanish Royals. I love to talk about the influence of St. Robert Bellarmine on the thinking of Thomas Jefferson and James Madison. But, above all, I love telling the story of the first explorers of America, largely Catholic, and the remnants of their explorations.
Archbishop Gomez of Los Angeles brought this to light as part of a speech he game recently titled, Immigration and the Next America: Perspectives From Our History. You can read it by clicking HERE; The history part starts on page 2 of the speech.
Monday, September 12, 2011
I'm in a New York state of mind
Archbishop Dolan's Blog has links to both his homily at the Mass he celebrated at St. Patrick's Cathedral yesterday, as well as Cardinal Egan's homily from the Mass he celebrated yesterday at St. Peter's Church, just across from Ground Zero.
Sunday, September 11, 2011
My 9/11/11 Homily
Aha, I gotcha! Yes, I'll get to this weekend's homily. But first you must sit through this informative presentation about a wonderful opportunity to own vacation property in Laurence Harbor, New Jersey. Well, not really. But this might be helpful to understand before I get to the homilies I preached this weekend.
My homilies are not, so to speak, "set in stone." They morph, they flow, they change from Mass to Mass. I've used the metaphor before, but I look at preaching a homily the way people use batting cages. You know, get in the cage, pop some quarters into the machine, 10 baseballs come at you, your job is to hit them. When I do it, the first round of batting cage baseballs is all about simply making contact with the ball; fouled off, bouncer to the pitcher, I don't care. The next round is about making decent contact with the ball: not just hitting it, but hitting it solidly. Once I've got this down, the rounds after this are when the fun begins. Now that I'm "in the groove", so to speak, it's time to see what I can do with the ball. Can I pull it? Can I go opposite field? Can I hit a power homer straightaway center field? Can I deliberately hit a base hit between the 3rd baseman and shortstop? Two weekends a month, in my parish, a Deacon preaches two Masses, leaving me to preach the other two. But the other two weekends (and the occasional fifth weekend in the month), I preach all the Masses. On those 4-homily weekends, the "batting cage" philosophy goes into effect.
Except for a Homiletics class I took in the seminary, I have never preached a word-for-word prepared text. Years ago in my political days I read a book of collected speeches by President Ronald Reagan, in which he revealed that he used a kind of written shorthand for notes for his speeches. My years of watching political speeches taught me that prepared texts do not keep peoples' attentions for long, so I made the resolution long ago to stay away from them. The papers I read from the Ambo are actually just the notes of what I want to say, things that jar my memory. If you read them out loud, they make little sense. They are, so to speak, the bat I will use to swing at these baseballs that will come at me. And what are the "baseballs", metaphorically speaking? The ideas, the concepts, the thoughts I want the people in the pews to hear, to understand, to think about and hopefully to take with them out of the church when Mass is over.
For the first homily, on Saturday night, I'm just concerned about getting my timing down as I'm delivering the homily. The Saturday night crowd is this subculture the Church has created whose overriding attitude is that Mass is something to be gotten out of the way so Sundays can be free for whatever reason. Believe me, many are sitting through my homily pondering not what I'm saying, but whether they'd rather go to the diner for dinner or for Chinese food?
The second homily happens at the first Mass on Sunday, and here that's the 8:00am Mass. The 8am crowd is, in some ways, like the 4:30 crowd from last night, except they've resolved that the Sunday is all theirs' AFTER Mass. The tougher thing about the 8am Mass crowd is to get a reaction from them. It's early in the morning, and very few are keen on laughing out loud (and certainly not answering any questions if I give them a 'pop quiz' on what they remember from last weekend's Mass?). "If you get the 8am Mass crowd to laugh out loud", I've told visiting clergy, "you've essentially jumped through two hoops. You were funny and you were funny enough to get a reaction out of them." That means I have to work harder to get my message into their heads, and so therein lies the connection to the second round of batting cage balls. I need to not just make contact with the balls, but good, solid contact. It's the "Pete Rose homily": mostly base hits, with the occasional strikeout and the rare home run.
If I've done that, then the next two Masses become the fun homilies. Having in my head what I want to say and how I can get that message out of me best, I can now have some fun with the homilies. Maybe a new opening? Maybe a quote from someone? Maybe a new joke? Maybe a different ending? Maybe a line from the weekend's readings that I didn't focus on before? The other homilies I focused on the Gospel; maybe this time I'll tackle what the 2nd Reading has to say and why it was included this Sunday? It would be personally boring to me to give the same exact homily multiple times at Sunday Masses, and if I'm bored with it I know that will seep out into my delivery and body language. The fear is that it leads to the "He doesn't care, why should I care?" attitude.
I tell you all of this as the world's HUGE-EST preface: In passing along my homily from this past weekend, I'm not really telling you what I said verbatim. I'm really synthesizing all four homilies, and in doing so presenting myself in the best possible light.
That being said, It's now more than an hour later than when I started typing. Now I'm hungry, and so you'll have to wait a little longer for the homily.
[It's the next day now - and here's the homily]
I'm always amazed how, more often than not each week, the Sunday readings seem to come have some relevance to both local and world events. A few weeks ago, last Monday, knowing what we'd be remembering this weekend, I looked at the readings, and there it was in front of me: "Lord, how often must I forgive?" I thought, "Whoa, Lord, you're good."
On this weekend when it seems that every channel on TV is re-presenting the events of ten years ago, begging us to remember the feelings we had, this weekend the Lord puts in front of us "The f-word": Forgiveness.
What can we say about forgiveness? We know that it's so important that, when Jesus gives the Apostles the Our Father (a prayer in which we ask for 7 things), He makes a point of having us ask God to forgive our sins. But he didn't stop there! He put a condition on it: "Forgive us our trespasses ...as we forgive those who trespass against us." In other words, we're asking God to only forgive our sins as much as we forgive those who hurt us.
That's the point of today's parable in the Gospel. The servant owes the King a huge amount, he can't pay it, and the King decides to forget about the whole debt. We call that "Grace": a free gift from God. Over the course of our lives, we've had thousands of those "grace meetings" with God, some graces we know about (going to Confession, receiving Holy Communion), some graces we won't know about until after we die. So the King forgives the huge debt of the servant, and that same servant refuses to forgive the debt he is owed by another servant. Matthew makes a point of telling us there's physical violence: the one servant chokes the other! Then the King finds out, and there's another meeting. This time, there's no grace, just judgment. We'll have thousands of "grace meetings" with God, AND, like the servant, we'll have exactly one "judgment meeting" with The King.
This time, I noticed the King has "torturers". St. Matthew makes a point of telling us there is more than one of them (he uses the plural). How do you get that job? Is there an exam you have to pass? Is it a civil service job? Do you start as an apprentice torturer and then work your way up? Can you imagine the job description? So he sends the servant to the torturers until he "pays the debt". THAT'S WHAT WE DO TO OURSELVES. When we refuse to forgive, we send ourselves to the torturers over and over.
The 1st Reading from Sirach lays it out so beautifully. "Forgive your neighbor's injustice; then when you pray, your own sins will be forgiven.", and, "Could anyone refuse mercy to another like himself, can he seek pardon for his own sins?" Once again, we can only expect God to forgive our own sins if we show Him that we are trying to forgive others who hurt us, just as He Himself does.
Why do we do it? First, because as St. Paul tells us in the 2nd Reading, "whether we live or die, we are the Lord's." But also because of what Sirach says, "Remember your last days." In other words, remember there will come a time when your life in this world will end, and think of what really matters in consideration of that. I was watching a show last night about the phone messages made by people trapped in the Twin Towers to their families. Knowing their lives were in danger, did they call their enemies to tell them, "I still don't like you!"? No, they called their families and said, "I want you to know I love you." When lives were on the line at Ground Zero, humanity wanted to give: store owners gave out food, cases of water, sneakers, whatever they had and people needed. Furniture owners sent recliner chairs to the site so rescuers could take breaks. Towns around the country sent filter masks, gloves, and even their own fire and rescue squads. Lines went out the door at Blood Banks around the country, as people wanted to give their own blood. Children around the world sent stuffed animals to the children of the deceased.
The Compendium of the Catechism of the Catholic Church (which is like the "Cliff notes" to the Catechism itself, says this in talking about forgiveness:
On this weekend, yes, we absolutely pray for the repose of the souls of those who were killed ten years ago. We pray for the families who lost loved ones and still feel their loss. Free will allowed evil men to commit an evil deed that killed thousands of people and directly affected all of our lives today (you know this if you've had to take your shoes off in an airport or bring 8 forms of identification just to renew your Driver's License). But free will can also be used for good. No one held a gun to police and firefighters and ordered them to try to save people in the Twin Towers or at the Pentagon; they freely chose to do so. No one demanded the passengers of Flight 93 over Shanksville get out of their seats and attack the hijackers; they freely chose to do so. God has given humanity a share in His free will. It means the decision rests with us to use our free will for good or bad intent. Forgiveness is a good. Forgiveness is more for ourselves, saying, "I won't let those who hurt me hurt me anymore. I won't let hate eat at me from the inside like rust." Today, whether it is a world event like 9/11, or a struggle with another person, or even a mistake we know we ourselves made, we ask God to give us the grace to "participate in the divine mercy", and forgive.
My homilies are not, so to speak, "set in stone." They morph, they flow, they change from Mass to Mass. I've used the metaphor before, but I look at preaching a homily the way people use batting cages. You know, get in the cage, pop some quarters into the machine, 10 baseballs come at you, your job is to hit them. When I do it, the first round of batting cage baseballs is all about simply making contact with the ball; fouled off, bouncer to the pitcher, I don't care. The next round is about making decent contact with the ball: not just hitting it, but hitting it solidly. Once I've got this down, the rounds after this are when the fun begins. Now that I'm "in the groove", so to speak, it's time to see what I can do with the ball. Can I pull it? Can I go opposite field? Can I hit a power homer straightaway center field? Can I deliberately hit a base hit between the 3rd baseman and shortstop? Two weekends a month, in my parish, a Deacon preaches two Masses, leaving me to preach the other two. But the other two weekends (and the occasional fifth weekend in the month), I preach all the Masses. On those 4-homily weekends, the "batting cage" philosophy goes into effect.
Except for a Homiletics class I took in the seminary, I have never preached a word-for-word prepared text. Years ago in my political days I read a book of collected speeches by President Ronald Reagan, in which he revealed that he used a kind of written shorthand for notes for his speeches. My years of watching political speeches taught me that prepared texts do not keep peoples' attentions for long, so I made the resolution long ago to stay away from them. The papers I read from the Ambo are actually just the notes of what I want to say, things that jar my memory. If you read them out loud, they make little sense. They are, so to speak, the bat I will use to swing at these baseballs that will come at me. And what are the "baseballs", metaphorically speaking? The ideas, the concepts, the thoughts I want the people in the pews to hear, to understand, to think about and hopefully to take with them out of the church when Mass is over.
For the first homily, on Saturday night, I'm just concerned about getting my timing down as I'm delivering the homily. The Saturday night crowd is this subculture the Church has created whose overriding attitude is that Mass is something to be gotten out of the way so Sundays can be free for whatever reason. Believe me, many are sitting through my homily pondering not what I'm saying, but whether they'd rather go to the diner for dinner or for Chinese food?
Yes, I know what they're thinking. I can read minds. I'm also a Jedi Knight. I just haven't figured out how to use the Force to lock the church doors so they can't all blow out of Mass early.By the end of that homily, I know whether the jokes work, whether something is worded awkwardly, and whether my notes take me where I want to go. After the homily is over, probably like most Bishops, Priests, and Deacons, I think of what I could have said that would have been better. So on Saturday night the homily again gets tweaked for use at Sunday Masses.
The second homily happens at the first Mass on Sunday, and here that's the 8:00am Mass. The 8am crowd is, in some ways, like the 4:30 crowd from last night, except they've resolved that the Sunday is all theirs' AFTER Mass. The tougher thing about the 8am Mass crowd is to get a reaction from them. It's early in the morning, and very few are keen on laughing out loud (and certainly not answering any questions if I give them a 'pop quiz' on what they remember from last weekend's Mass?). "If you get the 8am Mass crowd to laugh out loud", I've told visiting clergy, "you've essentially jumped through two hoops. You were funny and you were funny enough to get a reaction out of them." That means I have to work harder to get my message into their heads, and so therein lies the connection to the second round of batting cage balls. I need to not just make contact with the balls, but good, solid contact. It's the "Pete Rose homily": mostly base hits, with the occasional strikeout and the rare home run.
If I've done that, then the next two Masses become the fun homilies. Having in my head what I want to say and how I can get that message out of me best, I can now have some fun with the homilies. Maybe a new opening? Maybe a quote from someone? Maybe a new joke? Maybe a different ending? Maybe a line from the weekend's readings that I didn't focus on before? The other homilies I focused on the Gospel; maybe this time I'll tackle what the 2nd Reading has to say and why it was included this Sunday? It would be personally boring to me to give the same exact homily multiple times at Sunday Masses, and if I'm bored with it I know that will seep out into my delivery and body language. The fear is that it leads to the "He doesn't care, why should I care?" attitude.
I tell you all of this as the world's HUGE-EST preface: In passing along my homily from this past weekend, I'm not really telling you what I said verbatim. I'm really synthesizing all four homilies, and in doing so presenting myself in the best possible light.
That being said, It's now more than an hour later than when I started typing. Now I'm hungry, and so you'll have to wait a little longer for the homily.
[It's the next day now - and here's the homily]
I'm always amazed how, more often than not each week, the Sunday readings seem to come have some relevance to both local and world events. A few weeks ago, last Monday, knowing what we'd be remembering this weekend, I looked at the readings, and there it was in front of me: "Lord, how often must I forgive?" I thought, "Whoa, Lord, you're good."
On this weekend when it seems that every channel on TV is re-presenting the events of ten years ago, begging us to remember the feelings we had, this weekend the Lord puts in front of us "The f-word": Forgiveness.
What can we say about forgiveness? We know that it's so important that, when Jesus gives the Apostles the Our Father (a prayer in which we ask for 7 things), He makes a point of having us ask God to forgive our sins. But he didn't stop there! He put a condition on it: "Forgive us our trespasses ...as we forgive those who trespass against us." In other words, we're asking God to only forgive our sins as much as we forgive those who hurt us.
That's the point of today's parable in the Gospel. The servant owes the King a huge amount, he can't pay it, and the King decides to forget about the whole debt. We call that "Grace": a free gift from God. Over the course of our lives, we've had thousands of those "grace meetings" with God, some graces we know about (going to Confession, receiving Holy Communion), some graces we won't know about until after we die. So the King forgives the huge debt of the servant, and that same servant refuses to forgive the debt he is owed by another servant. Matthew makes a point of telling us there's physical violence: the one servant chokes the other! Then the King finds out, and there's another meeting. This time, there's no grace, just judgment. We'll have thousands of "grace meetings" with God, AND, like the servant, we'll have exactly one "judgment meeting" with The King.
This time, I noticed the King has "torturers". St. Matthew makes a point of telling us there is more than one of them (he uses the plural). How do you get that job? Is there an exam you have to pass? Is it a civil service job? Do you start as an apprentice torturer and then work your way up? Can you imagine the job description? So he sends the servant to the torturers until he "pays the debt". THAT'S WHAT WE DO TO OURSELVES. When we refuse to forgive, we send ourselves to the torturers over and over.
The 1st Reading from Sirach lays it out so beautifully. "Forgive your neighbor's injustice; then when you pray, your own sins will be forgiven.", and, "Could anyone refuse mercy to another like himself, can he seek pardon for his own sins?" Once again, we can only expect God to forgive our own sins if we show Him that we are trying to forgive others who hurt us, just as He Himself does.
Why do we do it? First, because as St. Paul tells us in the 2nd Reading, "whether we live or die, we are the Lord's." But also because of what Sirach says, "Remember your last days." In other words, remember there will come a time when your life in this world will end, and think of what really matters in consideration of that. I was watching a show last night about the phone messages made by people trapped in the Twin Towers to their families. Knowing their lives were in danger, did they call their enemies to tell them, "I still don't like you!"? No, they called their families and said, "I want you to know I love you." When lives were on the line at Ground Zero, humanity wanted to give: store owners gave out food, cases of water, sneakers, whatever they had and people needed. Furniture owners sent recliner chairs to the site so rescuers could take breaks. Towns around the country sent filter masks, gloves, and even their own fire and rescue squads. Lines went out the door at Blood Banks around the country, as people wanted to give their own blood. Children around the world sent stuffed animals to the children of the deceased.
The Compendium of the Catechism of the Catholic Church (which is like the "Cliff notes" to the Catechism itself, says this in talking about forgiveness:
Compendium #595 – “Mercy can penetrate our hearts only if we ourselves learn how to forgive – even our enemies. Now even if it seems impossible for us to satisfy this requirement, the heart that offers itself to the Holy Spirit can, like Christ, love even to love’s extreme; it can turn injury into compassion and transform hurt into intercession. Forgiveness participates in the divine mercy and is a high-point of Christian prayer.”"Even if it seems impossible" - the Church knows it's going to be hard for us. Forgiveness isn't a reflex like breathing, that a baby is born knowing how to do. Forgiveness is a learned behavior; we have to learn to know how to do it. It means we're not going to be good at it at first, but if we practice it, we'll get better at it. And not just in words, but to forgive, as Jesus says, "from the heart".
On this weekend, yes, we absolutely pray for the repose of the souls of those who were killed ten years ago. We pray for the families who lost loved ones and still feel their loss. Free will allowed evil men to commit an evil deed that killed thousands of people and directly affected all of our lives today (you know this if you've had to take your shoes off in an airport or bring 8 forms of identification just to renew your Driver's License). But free will can also be used for good. No one held a gun to police and firefighters and ordered them to try to save people in the Twin Towers or at the Pentagon; they freely chose to do so. No one demanded the passengers of Flight 93 over Shanksville get out of their seats and attack the hijackers; they freely chose to do so. God has given humanity a share in His free will. It means the decision rests with us to use our free will for good or bad intent. Forgiveness is a good. Forgiveness is more for ourselves, saying, "I won't let those who hurt me hurt me anymore. I won't let hate eat at me from the inside like rust." Today, whether it is a world event like 9/11, or a struggle with another person, or even a mistake we know we ourselves made, we ask God to give us the grace to "participate in the divine mercy", and forgive.
My 9/11/01 Memories
Here is a link to my blog entry from this day in 2007, when I sat at the keyboard and just began to type what I remembered from my day on Tuesday, September 11, 2001.
Thursday, September 08, 2011
September 8 - Our Lady's Birthday
First, the intellectual...
"In the 8th century, Andrew of Crete was the first theologian to see a new creation in Mary's birth. This is how he reasoned: 'Today humanity, in all the radiance of her immaculate nobility, receives its ancient beauty. The shame of sin had darkened the splendor and attraction of human nature, but when the mother of the fair one par excellence is born, this nature regains in her person its ancient privileges and is fashioned according to a more perfect model truly worthy of God. ... The reform of our nature begins today and the aged world, subjected to a wholly divine transformation, receives the first fruits of the second creation' (Sermon I on the Birth of Mary)."
Now, the personal...
Today is the 14th anniversary of the one and only episcopal ordination we've experienced in the Metuchen Diocese. On Sept. 8, 1997, Msgr. Vincent D. Breen was ordained and installed as the 3rd Bishop of Metuchen. I was a Deacon at the time, and my most vivid memory of the day was that I think I had some heat exhaustion. We were crammed into the sanctuary of St. Francis Cathedral, Bishops, Diocesan muckety-mucks, Servers, etc. Add to that a warm day and the heavy Holyrood dalmatics they had us vested in, and I could feel a headache and nausea sneaking up on me as the Mass went on. It wasn't until about 30 minutes into the reception at The Pines Manor that I began to come out of it (thanks to eating dinner rolls and sipping Diet Coke).
At the end of the evening (you know seminarians, we'll stay anywhere as long as there's free food), two of us who were going to be ordained Priests the following May introduced ourselves to the Bishop by saying we would be his first ordination class. His face lit up, he put his arms around the both of us, and said, "I'm very excited." I was just thankful I didn't throw up on him.
"In the 8th century, Andrew of Crete was the first theologian to see a new creation in Mary's birth. This is how he reasoned: 'Today humanity, in all the radiance of her immaculate nobility, receives its ancient beauty. The shame of sin had darkened the splendor and attraction of human nature, but when the mother of the fair one par excellence is born, this nature regains in her person its ancient privileges and is fashioned according to a more perfect model truly worthy of God. ... The reform of our nature begins today and the aged world, subjected to a wholly divine transformation, receives the first fruits of the second creation' (Sermon I on the Birth of Mary)."
Pope John Paul II
General Audience
May 15, 1996
Now, the personal...
Today is the 14th anniversary of the one and only episcopal ordination we've experienced in the Metuchen Diocese. On Sept. 8, 1997, Msgr. Vincent D. Breen was ordained and installed as the 3rd Bishop of Metuchen. I was a Deacon at the time, and my most vivid memory of the day was that I think I had some heat exhaustion. We were crammed into the sanctuary of St. Francis Cathedral, Bishops, Diocesan muckety-mucks, Servers, etc. Add to that a warm day and the heavy Holyrood dalmatics they had us vested in, and I could feel a headache and nausea sneaking up on me as the Mass went on. It wasn't until about 30 minutes into the reception at The Pines Manor that I began to come out of it (thanks to eating dinner rolls and sipping Diet Coke).
At the end of the evening (you know seminarians, we'll stay anywhere as long as there's free food), two of us who were going to be ordained Priests the following May introduced ourselves to the Bishop by saying we would be his first ordination class. His face lit up, he put his arms around the both of us, and said, "I'm very excited." I was just thankful I didn't throw up on him.
Wednesday, September 07, 2011
If you're reading this, say a prayer for Fr. Roberto Busa, SJ
L'Osservatore Romano's weekly English edition has an article about the death of Jesuit Father Roberto Busa this past August 9 at the age of 97. It's an interesting article to read, especially as you're sitting in front of a computer screen.Why? I'll let the author of the article tell you:
"If you surf on the Internet, it is thanks to him. If you jump from one site to another, clicking on links highlighted in blue, it is thanks to him. If you use a PC to write emails and documents, it is thanks to him. And if you can read this article, it is thanks to him."
Read the article HERE.
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